African irony: As Mandela departs, atrocity emerges anew

By Tom Cohen

Updated 12:35 PM ET, Sat December 14, 2013

Photos: Crisis in the Central African Republic98 photos

Crisis in the Central African Republic – A Central African Republic police officer chases looters attacking a broken-down truck Friday, February 7, in the capital of Bangui. The country, a former French colony, was plunged into chaos last year after a coalition of mostly Muslim rebels ousted President Francois Bozize.

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Crisis in the Central African Republic – Members of the Central African Armed Forces lynch a man suspected of being a former Seleka rebel Wednesday, February 5, in Bangui.

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Crisis in the Central African Republic – A Central African Armed Forces member kicks the man suspected of being a former Seleka rebel.

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Crisis in the Central African Republic – A woman runs for cover as heavy gunfire erupts in the Miskin district of Bangui on Monday, February 3.

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Crisis in the Central African Republic – Men take cover in a restroom as heavy gunfire erupts in Miskin on February 3.

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Crisis in the Central African Republic – A man screams after being arrested in downtown Bangui on Saturday, February 1.

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Crisis in the Central African Republic – A Christian fighter walks by houses burned by ex-Seleka forces in Bogoura, a small town in the Central African Republic, on Sunday, January 19. The Seleka have been forced out of power since the coup, but Christian militias, known as the anti-balaka, have been allowed to fill the power vacuum, Amnesty International said, with dire consequences for Muslim civilians.

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Crisis in the Central African Republic – Muslim civilians prepare to board trucks in Bangui to flee the capital on Saturday, January 18.

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Crisis in the Central African Republic – A truck packed with Muslim civilians and their belongings leaves Bangui on January 18.

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Crisis in the Central African Republic – Security volunteers use sticks to fend off people trying to enter a food and supplies distribution point at a makeshift camp at Bangui M'Poko International Airport on Thursday, January 9.

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Crisis in the Central African Republic – A French soldier waves to children as his jeep patrols the area between an airstrip and a makeshift displacement camp at M'Poko International Airport on January 9.

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Crisis in the Central African Republic – A French soldier and an African Union peacekeeper from Burundi patrol the Galabadja district of Bangui on Saturday, January 4. While insecurity continued to reign in many areas of the city, certain neighborhoods were tentatively reopening and some residents returning, at least during daylight hours.

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Crisis in the Central African Republic – An African Union peacekeeper from Burundi participates in a joint patrol with French forces in the Fouh neighborhood of Bangui on Janurary 4.

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Crisis in the Central African Republic – Displaced people walk amid makeshift shelters at a camp abutting M'Poko International Airport on January 4.

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Crisis in the Central African Republic – Children crowd around a volunteer who's distributing rice porridge at a makeshift camp at M'Poko International Airport on Friday, January 3. Escalating violence in the Central African Republic is posing a threat to children, with at least two beheaded and thousands recruited as soldiers, the United Nations said.

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Crisis in the Central African Republic – French Defense Minister Jean-Yves Le Drian, center right, speaks to a wounded soldier in a medical tent during a visit to the M'Poko Camp in Bangui on Thursday, January 2. France has sent 1,600 troops into the Central African Republic to assist African troops.

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Crisis in the Central African Republic – People displaced by violence attempt to create a semblance of normal life in a sprawling camp at M'poko International Airport on January 2.

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Crisis in the Central African Republic – A medical worker checks the injuries of a man who has been struck by gunfire. The man was treated at a Doctors Without Borders clinic inside a makeshift camp in Bangui on January 2.

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Crisis in the Central African Republic – A member of an armed neighborhood defense squad, which residents say is local Christian residents protecting themselves, carries a machete as he walks near a roadblock in Bangui on Tuesday, December 31.

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Crisis in the Central African Republic – People wait for evacuation flights in a hangar at the airport in Bangui on Sunday, December 29.

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Crisis in the Central African Republic – Displaced young people use a tree branch to climb a wall in Bangui on Saturday, December 28.

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Crisis in the Central African Republic – A man carries beams stripped from a Bangui house, back left, which is said to have belonged to a Seleka officer who had been attacking the surrounding Christian population.

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Crisis in the Central African Republic – French soldiers patrol the Fouh district in Bangui on December 28.

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Crisis in the Central African Republic – A man walks on a roof beam in Bangui on December 28 as local residents tear apart a house said to have belonged to a Seleka officer.

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Crisis in the Central African Republic – Angry Christians shout at a truck of fleeing Muslims in the Gobongo neighborhood of Bangui on Friday, December 27.

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Crisis in the Central African Republic – A young boy watches as people hurl rocks at passing vehicles carrying Muslims in the Gobongo neighborhood December 27.

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Crisis in the Central African Republic – Muslims are taunted by Christians when their truck breaks down in the Gobongo neighborhood of Bangui.

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Crisis in the Central African Republic – Cameroonians wait in line to board an evacuation flight at M'Poko International Airport, which is guarded by French soldiers on December 27. Military escorts shuttled citizens of Chad and Cameroon to the airport Friday to board evacuation flights as French troops stepped in to help Muslims fleeing north by road.

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Crisis in the Central African Republic – An African Union peacekeeper carries an elderly Cameroonian woman to a military vehicle in Bangui on December 27.

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Crisis in the Central African Republic – A young man who was hit in the back by a stray bullet cries out in pain at a Doctors Without Borders clinic in Bangui on Wednesday, December 25.

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Crisis in the Central African Republic – A militiaman holds a knife as he describes a recent attack in Bangui on Tuesday, December 24.

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Crisis in the Central African Republic – A motorcycle passes the remains of a mosque that was destroyed in Bangui in December.

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Crisis in the Central African Republic – French soldiers frisk a man at a checkpoint in Bangui on December 23.

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Crisis in the Central African Republic – French troops and civilians try to comfort a crying boy near the airport in Bangui on December 23.

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Crisis in the Central African Republic – French soldiers load a wounded man onto the front of a military vehicle to get medical help in Bangui on December 23.

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Crisis in the Central African Republic – Displaced people sit with their belongings at a makeshift camp housing thousands in Bangui on Saturday, December 21.

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Crisis in the Central African Republic – A boy looks out the broken window of a plane being used as shelter at M'Poko International Airport on December 21.

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Crisis in the Central African Republic – The body of a suspected militiaman lies in the road near a charred car in Bangui on Friday, December 20.

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Crisis in the Central African Republic – Christian men tear off pieces of the Gobango Mosque in Bangui on December 20.

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Crisis in the Central African Republic – People watch as French soldiers hold their position on a street in Bangui after hearing gunshots on December 20.

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Crisis in the Central African Republic – French troops patrol the Boy Rabe district of Bangui on December 20.

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Crisis in the Central African Republic – Tents are set up at a refugee camp near the airport in Bangui on Thursday, December 19.

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Crisis in the Central African Republic – A man carries a bag of food at a Christian refugee camp in Bossangoa, Central African Republic, on December 19.

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Crisis in the Central African Republic – A boy scarred from a machete attack waits at a pediatric hospital in Bangui on Wednesday, December 18.

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Crisis in the Central African Republic – An African Union peacekeeper stands on a chair December 18 as a small child sits on the floor of an Islamic center where refugees have sought protection in Bangui.

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Crisis in the Central African Republic – A severely malnourished child lays by his mother at a pediatric center in Bangui on Tuesday, December 17.

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Crisis in the Central African Republic – A French soldier patrols the Castor neighborhood of Bangui on Monday, December 16.

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Crisis in the Central African Republic – French troops patrol a street of the Muslim PK-5 district in Bangui on December 16.

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Crisis in the Central African Republic – Former soldiers linked to Christian militiamen rest Sunday, December 15, in a camp set up in a Bangui school. Christian vigilante groups formed to battle Seleka, the predominantly Muslim coalition behind the March removal of President Francois Bozize.

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Crisis in the Central African Republic – French soldiers patrol the streets of Paoua, Central African Republic, on December 15.

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Crisis in the Central African Republic – The Archbishop of Bangui, Dieu Donne Nzapa Lainga, preaches on Saturday, December 14, to people gathering at a refugee camp close to the Bangui airport.

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Crisis in the Central African Republic – Members of a militia opposed to the Seleka pose with weapons and amulets in the Boy-Rabe neighborhood in Bangui on December 14.

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Crisis in the Central African Republic – A Seleka presidential guardsman smokes at the downtown market in Bangui on December 14.

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Crisis in the Central African Republic – Christians at the Bangui airport gather in a makeshift camp for internally displaced people on Friday, December 13.

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Crisis in the Central African Republic – Muslim men rough up a Christian man while checking him for weapons December 13 in Bangui.

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Crisis in the Central African Republic – Peacekeeping troops from the Multinational Force of Central Africa shoot as they attempt to evacuate Muslim clerics from the St. Jacques Church in Bangui on Thursday, December 12. An angry crowd had gathered outside the church following rumors that a Seleka general was inside.

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Crisis in the Central African Republic – The bodies of 16 Muslim men are loaded onto a truck at the Nour Islam Mosque before being transported for burial in Bangui on Wednesday, December 11.

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Crisis in the Central African Republic – A young woman holds her baby at an elementary school in the Muslim district of Bangui on December 11.

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Crisis in the Central African Republic – People pray as they bury 16 coffins in a Muslim cemetery in Bangui on December 11.

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Crisis in the Central African Republic – French troops detain a suspected Seleka officer -- preventing a Christian mob from lynching him -- in Bangui on Monday, December 9. The mission of the peacekeeping force is to protect civilians in the Central African Republic, restore humanitarian access and stabilize the country.

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Crisis in the Central African Republic – French soldiers arrest an alleged ex-Seleka rebel in a neighborhood near the Bangui airport on December 9.

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Crisis in the Central African Republic – A man runs from gunfire December 9 during a disarmament operation by French soldiers in Bangui.

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Crisis in the Central African Republic – People gather around an alleged ex-Seleka rebel as he is arrested by French soldiers in Bangui on December 9.

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Crisis in the Central African Republic – People walk by a French soldier standing guard during a disarmament operation in Bangui on December 9.

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Crisis in the Central African Republic – A French soldier stands guard after the arrest of ex-Seleka rebels in a neighborhood near Bangui's airport on December 9.

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Crisis in the Central African Republic – French soldiers stand guard near a man they have arrested in Bangui on December 9.

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Crisis in the Central African Republic – French troops walk past two Seleka vehicles suspected of being set on fire by Christian mobs in Bangui.

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Crisis in the Central African Republic – A French soldier speaks to a suspected Christian militia member who was wounded by a machete in the Kokoro neighborhood of Bangui on December 9. Vigilante crowds said they spotted him with grenades and turned him in to French forces.

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Crisis in the Central African Republic – Mobs of Christians grab a child holding a knife in Bangui on December 9.

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Crisis in the Central African Republic – Children attend a mass given by the Archbishop of Bangui at Saint-Paul's parish on Sunday, December 8.

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Crisis in the Central African Republic – Children ask for biscuits at a base camp held by the French military in Bossembele, Central African Republic, on December 8.

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Crisis in the Central African Republic – Red Cross employees stand amid dozens of bodies at the morgue in Bangui on December 8.

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Crisis in the Central African Republic – Michel Djotodia, the country's president who had been one of the Seleka leaders, gives a press conference in his Bangui office on December 8.

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Crisis in the Central African Republic – A displaced child walks in Bangui on December 8.

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Crisis in the Central African Republic – Relatives of Thierry Tresor Zumbeti, who died from bullet wounds to the neck and stomach, grieve outside his home in Bangui on Saturday, December 7.

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Crisis in the Central African Republic – A former member of the militia that led the coup against the Central African Republic's president sits next to a machine gun as he and others stand guard at a shut-down market in Bangui on December 7.

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Crisis in the Central African Republic – Children play inside Bangui's Saint-Bernard Church, where their families took refuge following the wave of deadly violence on December 7.

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Crisis in the Central African Republic – French soldiers patrol a road in Baoro, Central African Republic, on December 7 as part of the military operation aiming at restoring security in the country.

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Crisis in the Central African Republic – A French soldier watches the road in Baoro on December 7.

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Crisis in the Central African Republic – People grieve for a man killed in Bangui on December 7.

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Crisis in the Central African Republic – Women push a coffin in the streets of Bangui on December 7.

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Crisis in the Central African Republic – A French helicopter lands at a base camp in Cameroon on Friday, December 6.

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Crisis in the Central African Republic – The U.N. Security Council votes Thursday, December 5 to authorize increased military action in the Central African Republic. The resolution, put forward by France, authorized an African Union-led peacekeeping force to intervene with the support of French troops.

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Crisis in the Central African Republic – People stand near bodies found lying in a mosque and in its surrounding streets in Bangui on December 5.

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Crisis in the Central African Republic – French military forces drive in Cameroon on December 5.

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Crisis in the Central African Republic – Civilians wait for treatment at Bangui's hospital after a daylong gun battle between Seleka soldiers and Christian militias on December 5.

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Crisis in the Central African Republic – A nurse tends to the wounded at Bangui's hospital on December 5.

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Crisis in the Central African Republic – Seleka soldiers race through Bangui as gunfire and mortar rounds erupt in the capital December 5.

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Crisis in the Central African Republic – Wounded civilians lie on the floor of Bangui's hospital on December 5.

Crisis in the Central African Republic – A severely wounded man lies unattended in a Bangui mosque December 5.

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Crisis in the Central African Republic – Shrouded bodies are seen in a Bangui mosque December 5.

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Crisis in the Central African Republic – Civilians seek shelter in a Catholic church in Bangui on December 5.

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Crisis in the Central African Republic – A Seleka soldier is briefed while manning a checkpoint in Boali, Central African Republic, on Wednesday, December 4.

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Crisis in the Central African Republic – Christians from the village of Bouebou load up on a taxi as they flee violence on December 4.

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Crisis in the Central African Republic – Christian children from Bouebou are packed in the trunk of a taxi as they flee violence December 4.

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Story highlights

U.N.: Sectarian conflict in the Central African Republic kills more than 600 people

The new atrocities raise questions about what has changed since Rwanda

"You've got to take action to stop it," expert says

The United Nations and United States are reluctant to intervene militarily

Another African milestone, another African tragedy.

In 1994, a stunning array of world leaders gathered in South Africa to celebrate Nelson Mandela's inauguration while genocidal massacres spread in Rwanda.

Now, the world focuses on South Africa again -- this time for Mandela's funeral -- as warnings of potential genocide emanate from Central African Republic.

The ironic juxtaposition of the greatest example of African reconciliation with horrific carnage elsewhere on the continent raises the question of what has changed in the 19 years since Rwanda to prevent the kind of targeted exterminations the world repeatedly vows to stop from happening again.

If the situation in Central African Republic is the guide, the answer is some change has occurred, but probably not enough.

Just Watched

Chaos in Central African Republic

On Friday, the U.N. high commissioner for refugees reported more than 600 deaths and 159,000 people displaced in the impoverished landlocked nation because of sectarian violence involving Muslim and Christian militias.

According to the report, the situation in Bangui, the capital, continued to deteriorate despite the presence of French and African Union forces sent to restore order and disarm the rival militia groups. Tens of thousands of refugees have fled to neighboring countries or gathered at the Bangui airport, which is being secured by foreign troops, it said.

The aid group Medecins Sans Frontieres slammed the United Nations this week for what it called an unacceptable humanitarian response, echoing similar frustration and despair heard from witnesses to looming crises in Rwanda and elsewhere in recent decades.

At the same time, the ongoing arrival of up to 1,200 French troops and 6,000 African Union forces drawn from several countries reflects a shift since Rwanda that put more responsibility for regional peacekeeping on Africans while demonstrating a willingness to act -- even if in a limited way -- in the face of atrocities.

To Gregory Stanton, a genocide expert at George Mason University in Virginia, the international response so far is lacking in a conflict that he believes "is genocidal already."

Stanton, who heads the nonprofit group Genocide Watch, said genocide occurs any time there are massacres targeting victims based on race, ethnicity, religion or nationality.

"If you have mass killings, whether it's based on religion or politics or whatever, we think that's bad enough," he said. "You've got to take action to stop it."

Rwanda symbolizes global failure

The Rwanda genocide, in which hundreds of thousands of people died over three months of ethnic attacks, remains the symbol for ineffective international response to African carnage.

U.N. peacekeepers scaled back as the organized Hutu slaughter of Tutsis escalated, and the world body and Western powers, including the United States, were blamed for failing to intervene more forcefully.

"The genocide in Rwanda has caused an enormous amount of soul-searching, particularly in the West," noted John Campbell, a senior fellow at the Council on Foreign Relations and former U.S. ambassador to Nigeria.

Now, he said, there remains "a sense that this absolutely should not have happened," as well as frustration in Washington and other capitals "over what in fact could have been done or should have been done."

Stanton described deep rifts in the Clinton administration at the time between officials favoring or opposing stronger intervention.

In particular, he cited a telephone screaming match between then U.N. Ambassador Madeleine Albright and National Security Council official Richard Clarke over orders for Albright to vote for withdrawal of U.N. peacekeepers in the face of the suddenly escalating violence.

"I just wish that it had not been something that the international community was not capable of dealing with," Albright told PBS in a 2004 interview.

Black Hawk Down effect

Campbell traced the U.S. reluctance to get more involved in Rwanda to the infamous intervention in Somalia less than two years earlier.

With famine and political dysfunction causing widespread starvation, the United States sent Marines to the East African country in December 1992 as part of an international force intended to restore order and get aid properly distributed.

However, the lack of functioning governance led to increasing sectarian violence, an expanded U.S. mission and the Battle of Mogadishu in October 1993, in which two U.S. Black Hawk helicopters were shot down and 18 American soldiers died while more than 70 were injured.

The event, which inspired the Hollywood film "Black Hawk Down," turned public opinion against continued U.S. involvement in Somalia.

"It showed the extremely limited domestic tolerance for intervention in Africa, particularly if it involves American lives," Campbell said.

He praised France for sending troops to Central African Republic now, noting a similar French commitment to a former colony when it intervened militarily in Mali in January with 4,000 troops to battle Islamist militants.

"The French seem to have much greater tolerance for casualties but also much greater support for French intervention" in countries it once colonized, Campbell said.

A caretaker role for its former colonies provides France with a sense of national prestige for its sphere of influence, as well as support as part of a Francophone bloc in international bodies such as the United Nations and World Trade Organization, he said.

Expert: Proper intervention saves lives

Stanton also lauded France for sending forces, but said the world needs to do more. He called for a much stronger military intervention, calling it the only way to effectively prevent what he labeled "serial killers going around and killing civilians."

"If you can send in a force that's so awesome that it will scare these militias into actually stopping and dropping their arms, you'll actually save lives," he said, asserting that the cost-effectiveness of intervention was far superior to dealing with the aftermath.

"For maybe $200 million we could have stopped the Rwandan genocide" instead of spending billions on relief aid, Stanton said, adding: "It's always less expensive to stop a genocide than to clean up afterwards."

In the 2004 PBS interview, Albright agreed with Stanton but said the realities of U.N. and U.S. politics at the time made such an intervention impossible.

"In retrospect, the thing that might have made sense is for a massive humanitarian intervention led by a major country; if not the U.S., then somebody else," she said. "But that was not even vaguely in the cards at the time."

Samantha Power, the current U.S. ambassador to the United Nations, won a Pulitzer Prize for her 2002 book "A Problem from Hell: America and the Age of Genocide" that posed the question of why the United States would "stand so idly by" when mass atrocities occur.

In a 2003 speech, Power described how the visceral reaction to genocide was to look away instead of getting involved.

"It's almost as though the worse the crime, the more likely we are to say, 'ugh, who can begin to go there, who can begin to think about making a difference when you have 8,000 people being murdered a day and bodies piling up around the U.S. Embassy and other outposts' " she said.

For years, Power noted, Congress avoided ratifying the 1948 U.N. Convention for the Prevention and Punishment of the Crime of Genocide, initially because senators from Southern states feared "Jim Crow" discriminatory laws could be cited as violations.

Even when the United States joined the convention in 1988, the pact had "very little bearing on the U.S. response to subsequent genocides," Power said.

In particular, she said, U.S. leaders refused to use the "G-word" to describe conflicts because "the feeling was in the United States government that it would oblige the United States to do things that it was otherwise ill-inclined to do."

After Rwanda, the United Nations and U.S. policy sought a more collaborative relationship with African nations on regional peacekeeping, partly to enable faster reaction and partly to avoid getting the full blame for failures as occurred with Rwanda.

"There has been a confluence between the Western and African approaches, which is African solutions to African problems, but with significant Western support but not boots on the ground," Campbell said, attributing the change to uncertain public support in Western countries for African intervention. "No democratic government can pursue very long a policy of outside intervention without popular support."

For the Obama administration, the issue of African intervention has been influenced by efforts to contain expanding al Qaeda influence on the continent.

A new policy announced in 2012 aimed at preventing mass atrocities included a series of steps at home and abroad that reflected better planning mechanisms and more collaborative efforts.

In a fact sheet released in May on the progress of the new policy, the administration cited the creation of an Atrocities Prevention Board comprising officials from across the government and military including the State Department, Pentagon, Treasury, Justice Department, Homeland Security, CIA, the vice president's office and the U.S. Agency for International Development.

According to the fact sheet, the board identifies emerging atrocity threats, assesses the risk of mass atrocities and takes steps to "ensure that atrocity threats receive adequate and timely attention."

However, there has been little public information on the board beyond the fact sheet, which listed steps taken so far including enhanced early warning measures, expanded use of sanctions and offering rewards to crack down on perpetrators, and "sharing the global burden by strengthening multilateral institutions and bolstering international peacekeeping capabilities."

That has meant involvement of the U.S. military in some cases.

"In central Africa, U.S. forces and civilian experts continue to advise and assist regional partners to counter the Lord's Resistance Army (LRA) , building on our comprehensive strategy, which also includes protecting civilians, encouraging defections, and providing humanitarian assistance," the fact sheet said in reference to the notorious armed group originally from Uganda now on the run in the region.

U.S. airlift of French, African Union troops

The administration announced this week that it was committing $60 million to support the French and African Union troops in Central African Republic, including planes to transport them in and out of the country.

"We are willing to provide the airlift. That is a huge change," Stanton said. "We weren't willing to do that in Rwanda."

The tactics reflect Obama's preference for taking a supporting role in international operations, such as providing support for NATO intervention in Libya in 2011 led by European allies Britain, France and Italy.

Violence has plagued Central African Republic since a coalition of Muslim rebels deposed President Francois Bozize in March, the latest in a series of coups since it gained independence from France in 1960.

French troops deployed alongside the African forces in a peacekeeping mission aimed at restoring security, protecting civilians and ensuring access to humanitarian aid.

It was unclear if it might escalate into the kind of slaughter that occurred in Rwanda, something that Albright warned in 2004 was hard to detect.

"The truth is that, unfortunately, every genocide ends up being slightly different, and they look more evident in retrospect than they do at the time," she told PBS. "One would hope that the lessons of Rwanda would be that you have to respond instantly. But you can't be sure."